The hardest thing to fix (is you)
by geoclaire
Summary: The road to recovery isn't an easy one. The clone family gathers around Cosima as she fights the clone disease.
1. Chapter 1

The lines between sleep and waking used to be softer.

Even when sudden, the waking process itself wasn't painful, wasn't a complex thing of red and bile, simply a transition that might end roughly, but without edges. Now the two blur together in a way she is rarely conscious of, unable to extend beyond experience to a world of reflection or thought, able only to gasp for air or vomit a vile mix of blood and green and yellow bile, or both at once. If she could think, she'd know she was at risk of aspirating. She'd want to know if the so called cure was going to cure her or if it had been far too late.

if she was aware enough to think, she would turn to the side to vomit and not risk her hair, the bed sheets, and her life every time her body convulses to reject the attempt to save her life.

—

"You said the treatment would help her!"

On the other end of the Skype connection, Delphine is distraught, hands over half her face. "It will. It _will_! It's just - she is so sick already - her body is strangling - _merde_! - struggling. Her immune system was suppressed to give her the treatment, and then - her body tries to fight the stem cells, it's stressful. But I think, think that part is nearly over. It's just - her body - she has to rebuild her lungs, her organs. She needs a lot of nutrients and she doesn't have them…"

"So she's starving and still has shithouse lungs." Sarah concludes succinctly. It's not that she doesn't care Delphine is struggling, it's just that Cosima needs her more right now. She doesn't have time to babysit her.

If it's possible, Delphine goes paler. "Oui. Yes. She needs food, water, warmth… All the support she can get."

Sarah scowls, "That's not going to happen when she pukes up everything we can get in her at all. She's sleeping when she's not choking or puking. And she doesn't need to be any warmer, she's burnin' up!"

Delphine bites her lip, her fingers picking at one another, rough enough to draw blood. "Can you get - an IV? Can Scott steal something, maybe, from the DYAD?"

"We haven't seen Scott since he gave us the syringe for Cos. Disappeared into the night before the psycho pirate could get her claws into him." Sarah pauses, thinking before she gestures Felix over. "Fi, do you know anyone we could get an IV from?"

Felix, come to stand behind her, sniffs dramatically before he answers, "About bloody time you asked. Am I really the last person you think of when it comes to injecting supplies?" He pauses long enough for them to think about that. "I truly hope Alison was your next port of call, do you not think these things through?"

—

The IV line, inserted by Felix with a level of expertise Sarah would prefer to pretend she doesn't know about, at least makes Cos look more like a deeply unwell human being than skin-draped bones. Cosima hasn't eaten since before she let Scott sink a syringe of stem cell goo into her veins, but the IV keeps her hydrated (says Delphine) so long as they replace the fluid every four hours.

She doesn't wake up, at least, not beyond what she needs to cough and choke and expel whatever fluid is currently clogging her lungs and body. It's been nearly a week since her eyes were open, let alone lucid, and she looks different now. More like Sarah, without her glasses or her eyeliner, only Sarah had never had cheekbones that could cut you.

—

Around day nine, they give up. Cosima sleeps more easily, but -

"Seriously, she's puked in her hair more times than I can count, Fi!" Sarah gestures wildly, her look shouting discomfort as loud as distaste. "Are we just gonna ignore it? You think she's going to care more about us cutting her hair than it being a snarl of shit?"

Felix gives her a moue of disdain as only he can, almost as good as when she used to throw her dirty socks onto his pillow. "You going to be the one to tell Goldilocks that we shaved her girlfriend's head like she has bloody consumption? Because I don't envy you the task."

He's got a point, always does, but - "Berloody Delphine can bloody deal with it. She's not here, Fi, and we're not coping, in case you missed it." She drags her hands through her own hair. "If Delphine or hell, Mrs S was here to help us, that'd be one thing, but they're not. Cos is fucking filthy and I haven't seen Kira in days and I…" she stops. "Just help me. Please?"

He shrugs, gracefully discomforted. "Fine." He tosses his own hair, then adds "– But I am not helping you shave her head. Do you know what a raving dyke she would look like? Those glasses, really."

He disappears into the bathroom before reappearing with scissors, comb, and electric clippers for good measure. Sarah wonders where Cosima's glasses even are.

—

On day eleven, she wakes up. It's weird timing, because Felix is just cleaning her neck and face as Sarah tries to understand Alison's instructions, delivered over the phone, on how to change sheets when there's a person actually in the bed. Her stress levels are way too high to handle Alison's means of instruction.

It's not ideal, either, because Cosima twitches as she wakes and gives Felix the fright of his life, so she wakes into a room of British-inflected cursing.

" - About gave me fucking heart failure, do you know what that does to a boys' looks? _Jesus_." Felix swears, his washcloth dropping to the floor.

Cosima blinks, before squinting, trying to see their faces. She coughs, too, but it's a dry thing, caught in her throat and not wrenching from her chest, and she catches sight of the IV in her arm when she tries to cover her mouth.

Hesitant, Sarah nudges Felix out of the way so she can sit on the bed. "Hey, Cos."

Cosima smiles her automatic smile, small but present, before her eyes flick between the two of them again and her forehead wrinkles.

"… the hell happened to you?" she mumbles.


	2. Chapter 2

The sheets smelt so vile that Sarah tried not to inhale when she stripped the bed. She didn't hesitate before tugging away the mattress protector as well. There were still stains on the mattress below - blood, and less determinate stains - but it was a huge improvement. Cosima might actually agree to get back into this bed once Felix finished bathing her. There was no way of knowing that it had been new barely a fortnight before, bought when it became obvious that Cosima wouldn't be going back to the DYAD and Sarah wouldn't be going home.

Cos had been the one who paid for it - "PhD money might as well do me some good," she'd shrugged - and she'd asked for it to be set it by the window. Sarah had helped her drag Felix's art slowly aside until they could nestle the bed into a corner where Cosima would be able to see out. It'd been a pain in the ass to maneuver to, but standing with an armful of bloody sheets, Sarah understood why she had wanted it. Bad enough if she was dying, but at least here she had a chance of looking out at life. That was Cosima all over.

From the bathroom came a thud, a yelp, and a splash. A very girly yelp, at that - she'd have to rib Felix later. She heard the sound of a mumbled laugh, and would have smiled if she hadn't winced, waiting for the cough.

The cracking sound made her shoulders tense, her back straightening involuntarily, and she turned away, brusquely gathering her armful of bedding to dump into Felix's pathetic washing machine. Three rotations on a soak cycle might begin to shift the grime, but for now, she'd need to find another set of sheets. And probably some more of the blankets she'd swiped by the shelfload from Mrs S' place.

—-

It's Alison who finally finds Cosima's glasses. They haven't seen her in over a week - Gemma has the flu, and Alison's rightfully anxious at the risk of exposing Cosima to anything else. _Immunosuppressed_, says the Delphine in Sarah's head, and Sarah may not like her much but it's pretty clear that keeping Cosima and her sisters alive has become her top priority. Alison was right to keep away.

It did mean that she and Fi had been on their own, though – Mrs S and Helena had both disappeared in the night, a cryptic text from S the only notable distinction. Marion Bowles had apparently pulled some kind of strings long enough to let Scott develop his stem cell therapy for Cosima, using the embryos Helena had left behind her (and what the hell were they doing in her possession? Jesus), but once he'd handed over a container and a syringe to Cosima, he too had high tailed it. Sarah had some doubts about his ability to stay under DYAD's radar, but that was a problem she had to trust he could solve.

Alison, though… Once she heard Cosima was awake, there was no keeping her away. She'd appeared like a tiny god of domesticity, armed with everything from extra blankets to bleach to vegetables, and immediately started scolding Felix, who had clearly not cleaned his apartment since the one time Alison had done it for him. Sarah tried not to laugh - the sharp end of Alison's temper was not a good place to be - but Alison's sounds of disgust at the state of his bathroom would put a crack in any straight face.

Even Cosima twitched bleerily awake at the sound of her haranguing, a testament to Alison's volume or perhaps her pitch. Cos blinked slowly, her mouth open, and Sarah turned to pitch a balled up cloth at the bathroom door. It missed, but it hit with the wall with a satisfying _thwop._ "Alison can you bloody _keep it down_? You might scare Felix into cleaning but you're waking up the invalid, too."

That made Alison reappear in the doorway, gloves firmly in place and sponge in hand, smiling tightly. She hasn't seen Cosima awake yet, and Sarah found herself glad they hadn't found Cos's glasses if it meant she couldn't see the uneasy look Alison was giving her.

But at least you couldn't hear it in her voice. "I'm glad to see you awake. How are you feeling?"

Cosima's non-IV laden hand twitched, likely attempting one of her broad gestures. "Been better," she breathed after a long second. Her hand stilled. "You?"

"Oh I'm - I'm fine," Alison touched her hair, her chin, before remembering her gloves. She disappeared back into the bathroom for a moment before returning unencumbered, coming closer to the bed. "The kids have both been sick, and Donnie had taken a lot of time off work while I was, uh, away, so I've been on flu duty. It seemed safer to stay away."

Cosima nodded a little. "Good idea," she said softly, her eyelids drooping til Sarah couldn't see her pupils. Alison sensed it; she came closer, her eyes running over the ruins of Cosima's hair before she dropped to crouch by the bed. "Is there anything you want me to do while I'm here? Soup? A bath?" she paused, "Do you want me to read to you?"

Cosima smiled a little at that, but her eyes were already closed. Sarah thought she'd probably fallen asleep halfway through the sentence. She looked at Alison, their eyes on a level with the way she sat on the bed. "Soup might be an idea. Fi and I are lousy cooks."

"Mmmm," Alison glanced away and then at Cosima again, "She could definitely use the calories." She turned to Sarah then, "Have you really lost her glasses? I hoped Felix was kidding."

Sarah winced, there was really no defending that. "They're around… somewhere. We took them off her when she was sleeping and then… god, I don't know, we didn't have much reason to look out for them, you know?" she paused guiltily, "Cos says she has another pair in her stuff somewhere."

Alison rolled her eyes, "I swear to – you two are absurd. And she's nearly as bad. Did you at least look down the side of the bed?"

"I - what?"

Alison didn't even respond to that, just looked heavenward again before she dropped to her knees, looking under the bed before reaching and twisting beneath where Cosima was sleeping. In seconds, a pair of dust encrusted dark glasses was in her hand.

"There," she said, breathing only a little hard, "What did I tell you?"


	3. Chapter 3

Alison might be uptight and kinda nuts, but her vegetable soup gave every appearance of being magical. She'd knocked it up in the space of an hour after sterilising every inch of Felix's bathroom, and the smell got into every inch of the apartment. Sarah figured it had even gotten into Cos's subconscious somehow, because she'd woken up again not long after Alison left, and she'd actually asked for food. It was the first time Sarah had seen her keep food down in over a week.

Eight meals of soup later, Cosima was clearly pretty over soup, but she was also starting to look better in a way that made Sarah feel safe enough to leave the apartment. Not that she had any plans of going far, only to the bar at the end of the street, where Cal had assured her the wi-fi network was totally insecure in a way that made it entirely too easy to hide a few Skype calls. He'd done something to her laptop to make it difficult to find, too, but told her calling from the bar would still be safer, and now Cos was doing better, she felt she could reasonably leave for a half hour or so. She wanted to talk to her daughter, damnit. And Delphine deserved a call too.

Seeing Kira on a computer screen wasn't as good as being able to hold her. Nowhere near. But seeing her smiling and safe with Cal went a long way towards unclenching one of the knots residing in Sarah's stomach. There were others, definitely; one fearful of Rachel's inevitable revenge, another long running concern about money, and a large one that centered around Cosima's wellbeing, currently smaller but still a potent source of stomach acid. Seeing Kira, though… that went a long way towards making her world better.

—

"How much better is aunty Cosima?" Kira's question knocked Sarah out of her thoughts. She'd been distracted by the need to examine her daughter, to try and identify any remaining harm the bone marrow extraction had done her.

"Lots better, monkey," she paused, trying to think how an eight year old would understand a long recovery, but was interrupted.

"Can I come see her?"

"Uh, not yet. She's doing better, but uh…" Sarah cast about for how to explain Cosima's slow recovery. "You remember when you broke your arm, sweetheart?"

Kira nodded, her bottom lip between her teeth. "Yeah, um. You know how it hurt when you first got the cast and then it got better? And then we took the cast off, but your arm was all weak and sore, not just where you broke it?"

"Yeah… is aunty Cosima like that?"

"Yeah, monkey. So… she's not actually sick-sick any more, but her body has to heal up now. So she's really really tired. Even eating makes her tired, she took a nap after breakfast."

Kira nodded quickly, but her face was uncertain, insecure. It made Sarah's heart clench, an irregular beat against her sternum. "Mommy… if I can't come see aunty Cosima, can you come here?"

"… Not yet, monkey. Aunty Cos still needs me to take care of her."

Kira was clearly unconvinced, " But why do you have to take care of her? Can't aunty Alison help?"

"Aunty Alison is helping, sweetheart, but aunty Cos needs me too." Sarah had to think fast, "Like, you know how Mrs S is best at, uh, making you toast when you're sick, but I'm better at singing? Yeah? And sometimes you want singing when you're sleepy, but sometimes you want toast?"

At that, Kira smiled, disbelieving, "Do you sing to aunty Cosima?"

Sarah laughed aloud at the sheer thought, "Not usually, monkey, but I will if she needs me to."

—

After that, talking to Delphine was almost easy, even if she responded with panic every time Sarah called.

"Is Cosima -"

"Relax, she's alive," Sarah interrupted, fluid from practice. "She's doin' a lot better actually. Like heaps."

The tension dropped out of Delphine visibly, her shoulders lowering three inches or more. "Is she conscious? Does she know where - ", she interrupted herself, clutching at her own crossed arms, "Tell me. Please."

Sarah had expected this, gave her the rundown she'd prepared in advance, "She woke up like three days ago and has been doing better since. She still sleeps most of the time but she's eating again and she pukes less often. Thank God," Sarah added. "Alison made her soup and we've been pouring it into her."

Delphine's smile quirked into being at that. "I think she would hate that."

"She does, but she's not up to doing anything but complain about it, so we spoon it into her til she goes back to sleep," Sarah paused, thinking, "And then she sleeps better, too. It's like freaking magic soup, to be honest," she added, half serious.

But Delphine's smile had gone away already, one hand coming up to pick at her shirt collar, the other still holding her elbow. "And her - her cough. Is it…?"

"It's better. Heaps better," Sarah reassured quickly. "I haven't seen her bring up blood today. And no seizures, not at all. Just… her cough still makes that cracking noise sometimes, you know? I don't like the sound of it."

If she'd hoped for reassurance from Delphine, to be told that the cough would go away on its own, she was out of luck. "She might - probably she is still healing. But it will be very easy for her to get sick now, when her immune system is still redeveloping."

That made Sarah's heart wring in a way that had become far too familiar, a cocktail of fear and anxious hope that she worked hard to suppress from showing. "Alison's kids have been sick, had the flu. But she stayed away, like right away, and Alison's fine," she grasped at straws, "It's not like Cos got better and then worse. Her cough just still sounds bad, that's all."

Dephine shook her head, "It might not be that, the flu - she could have caught anything and she would still get very sick. She should be in hospital, _mon dieu_."

Sarah let that slide, they both knew why hospital wasn't going to happen. "But she's doing better, Delphine, like, really better. She's more alert, she talks to us and knows who we are. Keeps trying to read and then falls asleep and drops the damn book."

Delphine's half smile came back at that, fond and charmed and still afraid all in one. "That's good, that sounds like her."

Sarah smiled at that, "We tried TV, but she kept getting mad at all the reality shows, and Felix banned her," she changes tack, "But Delphine. She's awake now."

"I know." Her smile died again.

Sarah pushed on, "Delphine, she's awake. She's going to start asking about you."


	4. Chapter 4

It was odd, but it was the boredom that ultimately got to Cosima. Being sick had been terrifying, but in its own way, even getting worse had been interesting. New symptoms had at least meant new evidence on the endeavour to find a cure and save her life. Getting better, on the other hand, had no intellectual value whatsoever, unless it was cataloguing new colours of coughed up phlegm - a science experiment the world could surely do without.

It wasn't like there was even anything to read in the damn loft, not once she'd gotten through _The Island of Dr Moreau_. Felix had offered her free range of his bookshelf, but given the genres ran the gamut from medium to hard core gay erotica, with a poorly concealed edition of _Twilight_ tucked in the back, there wasn't anything she was going to get enthralled in. In a moment of desperation, she'd picked up one of the less extreme looking tomes and skimmed it, but all that had done was demonstrate that it wasn't something she wanted to pursue. There were only so many ways to poorly describe rimming, and the story she'd perused appeared to contain all of them.

That had been closely followed by the occasion that Felix was calling the reality tv incident of 2012, and after that she'd been banned from watching tv. Which was a problem, because there were only so many ways to entertain yourself when you were basically bedridden. She would have killed for a spliff and her Nintendo, but both had been left stateside when she'd first gotten on a bus to Toronto, not to mention weed was almost definitely a no go for the foreseeable future. Her best prospect now was the promise Alison had made to bring her something to read on her next visit, and she was torn between hanging out for it and being convinced Alison was going to bring her _The Notebook_ and _Fifty Shades of Grey_ in a false cover.

All of that added up to bored, and bored let her think about Delphine, and where she was, and if she was okay, and none of that was good news. Not when she hadn't heard from her since before she'd presumably left the country, and Delphine had told her that they were both under threat if she returned, before breaking down and swearing that she would make it back to see Cosima. Those two things and total radio silence spelled a world of ills, especially where the DYAD was involved. Delphine had made a lot of mistakes where Cosima was concerned, but she knew - knew - Delphine would not have stayed politely at her new desk in Frankfurt when she believed Cosima was dying.

That conclusion did not lend itself to comforting thoughts.

"Felix?"

He came out of the kitchen nook, sticking his head around into her corner. "Yeah, Dreads?"

"How long til Sarah gets back?"

He looked up, glanced at the only clock in the apartment, one located annoyingly out of sight of Cosima's bed. "Don't know. Probably like another twenty minutes. Why?"

She swung her legs over the edge of the bed. "You wanna help me take a bath?"

He came and took her arm before she needed to ask, steadying her onto her feet, then looked her over, crown of head to the tips of her socked toes. "Darling, I have a much better idea."

—-

Neither Cosima nor Felix was immediately visible when Sarah got back, and her heart rate had already begun to rise when she recognised the criss cross of their voices behind the beaded curtain of the bathroom door. She dropped her grocery bags on the sole counter, largely juice and ice cream for Cosima, before going to hover outside the bathroom.

Felix had Cosima sitting in front of the mirror, a towel around her shoulders and scissors in his hands. He was focussing on her hair, so Cosima saw her in the mirror first, recognizing her silhouette even without the benefit of her glasses. "Sarah," she said lowly, and Felix looked up.

"Hello, stranger. We were starting to wonder if the DYAD got you," he said archly, and snipped his scissors for emphasis.

Sarah yanked her clone phone from her pocket and shook it at him, not a notification on the screen. "I see that. So worried you called and texted and checked, I see."

He sniffed, "Wouldn't want you to think I cared, now would I." Cosima was twisting around to look at them both, squinting to see their faces, and Felix repositioned her easily, hands on her forehead and neck to turn her back to the mirror, "Thoughts? I was going to trim her hair down into a pixie cut, but it's growing back curly."

Sarah gestured in the vague direction of Cosima's head. "What, Cos, you don't want the hacked off dreads look?"

Cosima gave her a tired version of her big grin in reply, "Felix assured me I look consumptive."

Felix snorted. "What I said was you look bloody tragic," he clicked his scissors again, "Come on, what's it to be? I figure I have about ten minutes before you need another nap."

Oddly, the haircut made Cosima look more like herself, though it couldn't have been further from her previous look. Even though Felix had been right and she'd gone back to sleep immediately after, her shorn head and glasses prompted an immediate pang of recognition when Sarah saw her slumped form on the couch.

A cupboard door shut behind her, and then Felix reappeared, handing Sarah a glass of whiskey where she stood. "Her hair's coming back curly," he said again, and Sarah raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, you said. My hair's kinda curly when it's short, too, you know that. An' remember what Kira was like as a baby?"

He shrugged at that, sipping his whiskey. "I forgot that. I was thinkin' more…" he gestured loosely, "Well, more like Helena curly I guess. I was wondering if, you know, her stem cells and all that…" he waved his hand again, loosely, helplessly.

Sarah stared at him, "You think her hair's growing back more curly 'cause she's got Helena's stem cells in her now? Holy shit, Fi," she gulped from her own drink, needing the security offered by her glass, "How the hell should I know?"

"Well, Dreads there can't exactly answer me, can she?" He winced, "I'm gonna need to stop calling her that now, aren't I. Bugger."

"Prob'ly," she couldn't answer his other questions. "I dunno, Fi. I mean, we're all the same, right? That's why Helena's stem cells were meant to work. If we're the same, it shouldn't matter."

He shrugged again. "I don't know, Sarah. I'm just saying I don't remember your hair ever curling like that."


	5. Chapter 5

It took a few days, but Alison did eventually come through on the books front, and Cosima made a point of mentally retracting every unkind thought she had had on the subject. Because Alison did better than bring her books; she brought her a tablet e reader, already loaded with over a hundred novels (none of which was _The Notebook_).

When Cosima tried to thank her, though, Alison just looked uncomfortable. "It was Beth's," she muttered, and toyed with the edges of her cardigan, "She loaded it with a gun owner's manual so I could read it without being obvious."

Cosima nodded and chose not to ask any more questions. It wasn't any of her business, even if a solid part of her had always drawn question marks around the exact nature of Alison and Beth's relationship.

And it turned out Beth had had far wider reading tastes than Cosima would have guessed - she counted four Man Booker winners and what appeared to be the complete works of Margaret Atwood in among the rest. Not her usual style, maybe, but certainly a damn sight better than hanging around the apartment with nothing to do at all. She picked a novel at random (_Lady Oracle_) and, at Felix's meaningful look, settled herself back into bed, propped up on four pillows and one of Kira's soft toys.

When she woke herself up coughing (bringing up a thankfully bloodless fluid onto her quilt), she was pleased to have gotten through more than a chapter before falling asleep. She even remembered most of it.

—-

They made a point of not leaving her alone. It spanned the gamut from endearing to utterly claustrophobic, but it was also the most time she'd ever spent with her clones, and the combination of time and nothing else to do let her notice things she would probably never have known otherwise. Things like the number of Beth's mannerisms that Sarah didn't share, or the way in which her protectiveness of her clones possibly equalled that of her devotion to Kira. Like the extent of Felix's devotion to Sarah, probably beyond all rational bounds, and his genuine fondness for Alison.

Or like, the fact that Alison was surprisingly good at bathing her.

"Head back, eyes closed," Alison reminded, and Cosima found herself complying without thinking about it. Alison had one hand shielding her eyes, the other tipping a jug of water to rinse conditioner from her hair. The warm water felt good, poured slowly over her scalp, as did the water she sat in. The whole thing was soothing, relaxing her sore muscles and bones, and warm in a way she couldn't seem to manage with clothes and quilts. It felt good just to notice that something felt good.

It probably should have been awkward, sitting naked in the bath in front of a woman she wasn't sleeping with. Hell, wasn't even close to. But Alison was so matter of fact about the whole thing that Cosima had barely remembered to feel uncomfortable. She'd waited outside until Cosima was in the tub, and gotten the okay to come in, but then she'd moved to washing Cosima's back and legs and arms with a washcloth with barely a pause. And she'd been gentle, too, something Cosima truly appreciated when it felt like her body had recently been dismantled and pieced back together with screws.

"I feel like this should be weird," Cosima eventually mentioned.

On her knees by the bath, Alison paused. "What should be weird? Specifically."

Scrunching her face up, Cosima shrugged. "No one's given me a bath since I was like, eight," she stopped to reconsider, "Except Felix, obvs."

Alison raised her eyebrows. "Felix has been giving you baths? Not Sarah?"

"… Yeah, actually. Sarah ducks out every time. Like it makes her uncomfortable." she shrugged, "I don't mind, suspect Felix's idea of grooming is a higher grade than Sarah's anyway."

Alison still seemed unimpressed. "You should have said something sooner. I don't mind helping out, not now Gemma is doing better."

Ah, Gemma. "Do you still bathe her?"

Alison tipped her head to her shoulder, then back. "Not usually, any more. I just check in at the end when she's nearly done," she smiled downwards, "but I bathed her for years, of course. Both of them. Oscar was a little prince, but Gemma always fought me washing behind her ears, and she managed to soak me almost every time with her splashing. She was better for Donnie, but I think he let her get away with not washing her ears."

"Cheating, really," Cosima observed, wrinkling her nose.

"Well, counterproductive, certainly," Alison leaned back on her heels, stretching her back out. "I assume you can manage the rest?"

"Uh, yeah." she found the washcloth and waved it weakly. "Can you, uh…"

"I'll wait outside, call when you need me. Do _not_ attempt to get out without me, Felix told me about your dizzy spells."

"Uhhh, okay." Being bathed by Alison might not have been as deeply embarrassing as she would have expected - maybe it was the clone thing? Or that Alison read as incredibly heterosexual ninety-nine percent of the time? - but having to be picked up naked off the floor was certain to be horrifying. And _cold_.

Alison nodded, standing up without touching the floor or walls, already unrolling her sleeves and sweater cuffs. "Call me, Cosima. I mean it."

—-

Being bathed was almost the least of it. Her clones really didn't leave her alone. Sarah or Alison or Felix was always nearby, something it took her an embarrassingly long time to realize. It wasn't until Felix was entertaining her with tales of his conquests one night as he painted that she realized she hadn't seen him go out since she'd been there.

"Have you lost your game, Fi?"

"What am I gonna do, bring them back here while you're coughing your lungs out in the corner? Sexy as," he retorted, turning back to his painting.

Sarcastic or not, they'd gathered around her, trying to take care of her. Sacrificing their time and safety and any remaining goodwill from the DYAD to try and keep her alive. She'd told Sarah once that they were her biological imperative; maybe she had been more right than she knew.

Maybe too - she yawned - it was time for another nap. She cleared her throat, and snuggled down with Kira's monkey. Coughed, and was asleep.


	6. Chapter 6

Kira kept asking to see Cosima, and at some stage, Sarah lost her ability to say no. She wasn't totally thrilled about it, and had no intention of putting them in a room together - Why tempt Duncan and the DYAD? - but Kira was insistent, and phones existed for a reason. Skype would have been better, but a cell phone was immensely more portable.

Having lost the main battle, she put up a spirited retreat. She was still concerned enough about Cosima to go over guidelines with Kira beforehand. Enthusiasm was okay, tiring Cosima out wasn't. Asking about her health would be rude, and putting pressure on her to be allowed to come visit was totally out. And when Sarah said the conversation was over, that was it, no whining.

Even Cosima scowled at that one, her eyebrows rising. Sarah rolled her eyes at her clone, she and Kira were as bad as each other, and it would have been irritating if she weren't so utterly charmed by how taken with each other they were. But what else was she expecting? Kira took to most people with ease; she'd progressed to hugging Helena at a point when Sarah was still thinking about hitting her with a chunk of rebar. Cosima was marginally more reserved, but once she'd formed an attachment to someone, she'd talk about their awesomeness even in her sleep (Sarah had totally failed to understand the obsession with Delphine's hair right up until she had met her). The two of them together were a bundle of excited enthusiasm she couldn't begin to compete with - hence the insistence on guidelines.

She'd have been offended at how quickly Kira got her off the phone if she hadn't been able to hear the excited squeal she let out when Cosima got on the phone from across the room. Instead, she made a point of eyeballing the time; her plan was to check in with Cosima after ten minutes and cut her off at twenty.

Cos might have been doing better, but she also had a strong tendency to overestimate what she could currently achieve. Felix had told Sarah about having caught Cosima as she got up too fast and began to faint, and Sarah had become rapidly expert in recognising the whiteness around her jaw and the ways the tendons in her neck stood out when Cosima got too tired. She was pushing herself hard, at a point when that meant napping on the couch instead of in bed, and Sarah was pretty sure she'd stopped regaining weight. In a way, it had been easier when she was too sick to move around; she wasn't able to fight the IV or the oxygen tubes then. Now it was a hassle to have her wear a beanie over her clipped hair.

She was scratching at her head under that knit beanie now, curled up on the couch and listening to Kira chat. Sarah wasn't entirely sure, but from what she heard of Cosima's end, they seemed to be talking about Harry Potter. Between them, Duncan and Cosima seemed to have gotten Kira into a sci fi and fantasy phase, but at least Harry Potter seemed a little more age appropriate than that nightmarish Doctor Moreau.

She didn't want to be the person who would sit and monitor their conversation, though, so after a minute she went to Cosima's bed and brought her back a blanket. The loft was chilly, and she wasn't going to be able to coax Cos back into bed without interrupting them, but then - she draped the blanket over Cosima, who pulled a face at her - Cos also couldn't complain without interrupting Kira.

"Yeah, I know, Hermione is bossy for a while, isn't she?" Cosima asked sweetly.

Okay, so maybe she could.

Sarah took the hint and went into the kitchen, started to look for something that Alison would consider food, even though she knew Cosima wasn't picky. Between them, Delphine and Alison had managed to press on Sarah that Cos would need good nutrition for the foreseeable future, and it was harder when she'd been mostly vegetarian for years. Sarah wasn't much of a cook to begin with and excluding anything that had feet had made it a lot harder.

She stared into the fridge for inspiration, then pulled out ingredients for an omelette. It would be the third omelette she'd made since Monday, but it would also contain vegetables, eggs and dairy, all of which were on Alison's approved list. Delphine had been less picky, had simply mandated that Cosima should be eating anything that didn't come packaged as a single-serve to be cooked in the microwave. Sarah was pretty sure there was a story behind that one, probably revolving heavily around university students and weed.

She started chopping vegetables, leaning heavily to the green end of the spectrum. Cosima was weirdly fond of spinach, and she was totally prepared to bribe her if that's what it took. But it only took her another minute or two before she heard shuffling, and Cosima appeared - sans blanket, but wearing her ugg boots and beanie - to hand her the phone.

"Kira wants to say bye. She may also -" she coughed into her elbow, hand to her chest, "have a question about dragons versus dinosaurs."

"Oh, Jesus, really?" she took the phone, pressing it immediately to her ear. "Hey, monkey. Not too cool for me now you know aunty Cosima's doing okay?"

Cos smiled, then turned, hand on the bench to steady herself before she shuffled away, thankfully in the direction of her bed and not the couch. That distracted Sarah, so it took a moment to hear Kira's sniffle.

She put the knife down. "Baby, what's wrong?"

That had Kira start to cry in earnest over the phone. Sarah panicked, left hand flying to grip her hair, unable to hold her daughter. "Kira, honey, I need you to calm down a little, okay? I need you to tell me what's wrong." she gripped the phone, "Is there someone there? Is something happening?" she cast about, "Did aunty Cos say something that upset you?"

It took a long minute of sniffs and sobs before Kira could even respond. "You said aunty Cos was getting better!"

It felt like her heart was being clenched by a fist in her chest. Sarah took a long breath, let it out slowly. "She is, baby. I swear. I know - I know she sounds bad, okay? But she's doing a lot better now. She's tired, mostly, like - like I told you before. But she is getting better."

That didn't seem to help. If anything, it made it worse, Kira's sobs becoming louder once more, breathing through her mouth like only a crying child could. Sarah hushed and shushed and hummed the best she could, dying a little inside all the while, trying to just calm her daughter down. Jesus. She'd thought this was a bad idea, but she'd thought that for Cosima's sake, not Kira's.

Eventually, she managed to persuade Kira to pass the phone to Cal. He'd clearly been nearby, and anxious, for he took over the call immediately.

"Jesus, Sarah, what'd you tell her? Did someone die?"

"No! No, nothing like that," she weighed it up for a second, but there was clearly nothing to be gained at this point by not trusting Cal. "She talked to Cosima and it upset her. I think she thinks Cos is dyin'. And she's not, she just - she just sounds bad, I swear. She's sick, but she isn't dying. I told Kira she's getting better, but she doesn't believe me."

Cal paused, "Yeah, hang on Sarah," there was a silence for a minute, then talking and movement in the background. Cal came back on the line, "I've got it now. I didn't… didn't know she was so attached."

Sarah sighed, "Surprised me too. I did not see this coming." she fidgeted with the food on the bench, "Can you give her a hug from me? Tell her I'm sorry. But I'm sure Cos is getting better."

"Okay, I'm hugging her now, but the next one can be from you, okay? Deal, monkey?"

She heard Kira say a doubtful yes, and her hand clenched on the phone. But she had to get off if Cal was to have any hope at talking her daughter down. "Okay. Okay. Bye, Cal. Give her my love."

"Will do. Bye, Sarah."

"Bye, mummy."

He must have tilted the phone down to Kira. Her heart clenched in on itself again, and then there was nothing but the dial tone.


	7. Chapter 7

She should have listened to Kira, because after that, things became rapidly more complicated, and their temporary haven became increasingly precarious.

For one, the phone didn't stop ringing; Marion Bowles called to give Sarah a heads' up that Rachel was showing signs of recovery (no new eyeball, of course, although Sarah wouldn't have put it past her to steal one from another clone if she could find a way; but she was through the surgeries and beginning to be able to walk around and rehabilitate), Cal called to let her know that Kira had calmed down, but that she was saying some weird things about Mrs S and remained convinced that Cosima was dying. Sarah didn't begin to know what to do with any of that.

Then some time past midnight, her phone rang and rang, and Sarah couldn't find the damn thing, and when she finally dug it out from a mass of discarded scarves and eyeliner pencils on the coffee table, the screen was blank. She stared at it bleerily, trying to catch up after being startled awake.

Then the ringing began again, despite her phone being immobile in her hand, and she was just sleep deprived enough to be bewildered before she heard Cosima's sleepy, confused, "Hello?" from the next room.

_That_ was enough to wake her up in a hurry. Cosima's clone phone hadn't rung the whole time she'd been here, and her regular phone had been switched off after she'd made a carefully phrased phone call to her parents. That it was ringing now… only five people had that number, and three of them had no need to call her. A call at two in the morning would only be coming from Scott or Delphine, and Sarah knew where her money was.

"_Delphine? Holy_ - holy shit. Are you - are you okay? Where are you?"

Yeah, Scott had been pretty good at keeping his head below the parapet. Delphine, on the other hand, was always going to make some kind of desperate stand to get back to Cosima with a cure.

"No I'm - I'm fine. I mean, I'm not fine, I want you here, but I'm like, I'm getting better. And you -" Cos stopped, listened, and Sarah found herself craning to hear without meaning to, "Delphine, where _are_ you? Where have you been?" She paused again, longer this time. "No, that's - Delphine, don't. Please, don't. Not if you're going to be in danger."

Cosima was sitting up by then, legs over the side of the bed but still entirely tangled in the sheets, gesturing large with her free hand. Sarah avoided her eyes, giving her what little privacy she could. "_Del_ - it isn't worth it. If you fly, they'll be records, they'll be able to find you. I want you here, but not if the DYAD track you down - do you not - _Del_ - _Delphine_ - no, I'm fine, I don't _need_ a cure, I need you alive and - I - _fuck_. Please don't. Please," her free hand was over her eyes now, "I understand, I just - I love you too. I can't do this without you. Please, _please_, be safe."

Cosima dropped the phone into her lap, her head hanging low. Sarah waited, trying to give her a moment, then went to her, sitting carefully by Cosima on the bed. "Hey. You okay?"

When Cos opened her eyes, sans glasses, Sarah could see tears glinting on her lashes. That shook her; she'd seen Cosima cough and puke and spit blood, but even when she thought she might be dying, she'd barely seen her cry. It looked wrong on her face.

"How long have you known?"

That wasn't the response Sarah had expected. "What?"

The look Cosima shot her then held fire. "How long have you known where Delphine was? What she was doing?"

_Oh_. " - a while now. She managed to get a phone off the grid, kept calling while you were… out of it… Eventually I answered your phone." Sarah tried to smile, "Your girl is real persistent."

Cosima ignored that entirely. "She's in France, but I suppose you already know that."

Sarah found herself fumbling for words; Cosima was the last person she expected accusations from. "I uh - no, she was still in Germany last time I talked to her… trying to get the original DNA, she must have moved." She paused, "Is she coming here now? What's happened?"

Cosima didn't respond, and Sarah found herself edging closer, still hesitant to touch. "Cos, what's wrong?"

Cosima dropped her head into her hands for a long minute. When she lifted it, her face was unreadable, no more tears visible in her eyes. "What's wrong, Sarah? What's _wrong_? How long have you been in contact with her?"

"Um, a couple of weeks, I guess?" Sarah hazarded. It was probably longer, but admitting that seemed like a bad idea.

Cosima shook her head, disbelieving. "And you didn't think to, I don't know, _tell me_ that you'd heard from her? That you were chatting every other day? That she was rummaging around in the depths of the DYAD where anyone could fucking find out and decide that she was a problem? You didn't fucking think I might want to _know_ any of that?"

Sarah floundered. "No - Cos - I thought - you were so sick, I didn't think you'd remember -"

"I was not so goddamn sick I wouldn't have remembered _that_, you idiot! I thought she was _dead_!"

Somewhere in the flat a tap was dripping, a repetitive _drub-drub-drub_ that Sarah had never noticed before. It was the only sound she could hear beyond Cosima's harsh breathing, crackling in her chest and through her mouth and nose. Cosima clutched her fist over her heart, rubbing hard, and Sarah opened her hands to her.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm really really sorry. I didn't know you were scared, I just," she grasped for answers, "I didn't want to tell you unless I had good news. I didn't want you to worry, alright?"

Cosima snorted, then had to catch her breath, her flattened palm now rubbing over her breastbone. "You really didn't think I'd be worried anyway?"

It wasn't like she didn't have a point, but - "I kinda thought you were focussed on the whole not-dying thing, to be honest. And you were sicker than you think," Cosima gave her a disbelieving look, and she supplied, "Last week you made a lot less sense than you thought you did."

Cosima huffed a dry laugh, the sound rattling from her throat. Sarah braced herself for more nature versus nurture, or worse, further accusations, but Cos went quiet instead, pulling her blanket around her shoulders and tucking her feet up onto the edge of the bed.

Moving slowly, Sarah put an arm around her shoulders, pulling Cosima into her. Beneath the blanket, her clone still felt too hot and too skinny, each shoulder blade distinct against Sarah's arm. Cosima turned her face into Sarah's shoulder, allowing the embrace, but not returning it.

It took a long minute before she spoke again. "Did you put her up to this?"

Sarah had to backtrack. "Did I… talk her into snatching the original DNA and doing a runner across Europe? Nope, that was all her idea."

"Of course it was," Cosima huddled in on herself still further, and Sarah found herself absently stroking her hot back, calming the racing heartbeat she felt too easily. "Sarah, how could you not tell me?"

Sarah couldn't let herself pause, or she wouldn't be able to say it. "I wasn't sure you'd need to know."

Cosima closed her eyes. "You thought I was going to die."

There it was. Sarah had kept so many things to herself, only halfway thinking her efforts would ever make a difference, without ever admitting why. She pursed her lips, looked down. "For a while, yeah."

Cosima nodded slowly. Then she turned away and coughed, coughed, coughed again, and gasped for air like it surprised even her. She hacked in a way Sarah hadn't heard in weeks, and she scrambled to get behind Cosima on the bed, recognising she was choking.

She didn't get there before Cos gasped, hacked again, and brought up a clump of mucus onto the floor. Even in the poor light from the window, Sarah could see it was clotted with blood.

* * *

I am so sorry. Please don't hate me.


	8. Chapter 8

For reasons known only to herself, Alison carried a stethoscope in the first aid kit in her car. It was certainly strange, but it was also quite useful if you happened to be trying to care for a clone with a lung disease - an eventuality Alison had probably not, Sarah acknowledged, had in mind at the point of purchase.

Cosima, on the other hand, had suddenly become a lousy patient. Sure, she'd been increasingly resistant in the last week, wanting to do more and more herself as she'd become able, but it had suddenly leapt to all new levels. She'd flatly denied the need to check her vitals, refused to stay in her bed, even extended to batting Alison's stethoscope away like an irritable child. Sarah had been disconcerted by the behaviour, but Alison had swung into gear like she was going into battle. Against her will, and rather vocal protests, Cosima had been bathed, transferred into clean pyjamas (and actual pyjamas, not an old pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt swiped from Felix), and had her breathing listened to and temperature taken in short order. Now she was back in her bed, albeit sitting up, with a face like a thundercloud.

Alison sat back on her heels, reading the thermometer in her hand. "Well, I think that might explain a few things," she murmured, rubbing her free hand absently over her thigh.

Lurking by the door, Sarah took in Cosima's scowl and Alison's thoughtful face at once. "What? What explains what?"

Alison ignored the rude noise Cosima made. "She has a fever. 38.9 degrees, which would explain her charming behavior." She added pointedly. Cosima rolled her eyes in response.

Sarah's stomach turned over. She remembered how hot Cosima had seemed to her the night before, the irregularity of her anger; and her new crankiness started making a lot of sense. "So she's sick again, yeah? She got worse?"

"_She_ can hear you," Cosima interjected, "and she says she is fine." She rubbed her chest, fingers hard against her breastbone, then coughed twice with a disconcertingly wet sound. "I am _not _getting worse, that doesn't make any sense when the treatment worked."

Sarah wrinkled her brow, and ducked down to meet her eyes, "Cos, seriously? Do you not hear yourself coughing?"

Cosima ignored her and looked away, her wrinkling of her nose contributing to a mutinous look. Alison caught Sarah's hand in her own, catching her attention, "Actually, I think Cosima may be right. I don't think she's getting worse again."

Still half crouching, Sarah's eyebrows shot up. "I'm sorry, can YOU hear her coughing?" She asked, straightening up.

"Really, Sarah, there's no need to..." Alison started half heartedly, then gave it up. She was still kneeling on the floor, looking up at Sarah; she gestured now with the thermometer, her free hand open and supplicating. "I can hear her cough, but I also took her temperature, and I don't think this is the clone... Problem. I think this is something else."

Cosima pointed at her with her first and pinky fingers. "Right on, sister! Told you I wasn't getting worse," she crowed. Then her gaze moved to Alison, and she brightened, "Hey Ali, do you think your boy Ramon has any good weed?"

* * *

It took a while, but they eventually managed to coax Cosima to stay in bed while they adjourned to Felix's bed platform, the only part of the apartment where they had any chance of talking without being overheard. Getting Alison to get past being considered the clone dealer took almost as long, but Sarah eventually got her back on topic.

"Not to _mention_ marijuana is extremely inadvisable in her condition -"

"Yeah, 'bout that," Sarah interrupted. "I'm still pretty unclear on what that condition _is_. If she was sick before and she's sick again, what's the bet that it's the same thing comin' back?"

Alison subsided, sitting neatly on the side of the bed. Sarah stood across from her, leaning against the wall. "I see what you're saying, but I think…" she hesitated. "I know it seems logical that the, the treatment stopped working and she's going backwards. But if you think about it, her symptoms are different from before."

Sarah opened her mouth, then paused. Sure, Cosima had been sick before, but she hadn't been surly or petulant, and while she'd been mildly feverish for most of a month, it hadn't been something you could feel through her clothes. "She's wheezing now," she offered cautiously after a moment. Indeed, she could just hear Cosima's breathing in the next room even now. "Before she coughed, and spluttered and hacked and whatever, but you couldn't hear her breathing all the time."

Alison nodded vehemently. "Her chest sounds different. It sounds crackly, but before, her breathing sounded wet. And her fever is a lot higher, and she's…" she searched for a term, concluded politely, "Crabby."

Sarah barked a laugh at that. To Alison's expectant look, she expanded, "We're part of a secret clone conspiracy, funded by at least two hugely wealthy institutions and the military, who did years of medical research, and we're trying to figure out what's wrong with Cos based on her being a little shit." She snorted, "Meanwhile, Cos herself won't help us, and who even knows if Delphine will make it back. We're fucked."

Alison smiled weakly, looking own, but she clearly didn't find see the humor in it. Probably that was the benefit of perspective, occasionally leaving the apartment and having contact with the outside world. She wasn't losing sight of how big a problem they had. And yet, she soldiered on, "So, maybe it isn't the clone disease, but she's still sick and getting sicker."

"Well, we might get some help with that, if Delphine does make it back," Sarah offered. She'd told Alison earlier about the phone call in the night, Cosima's conviction that Delphine was trying to make it back to them. By her reckoning, it was a faint hope, but better than nothing. "She should have some idea about what's actually wrong."

Alison sniffed, folding her hands back into her lap, and began to inspect the hem of her blouse. "Yes, but that's something of a long shot, don't you think? And it isn't like she's the only doctor around."

"Er, what?" Sarah took a step away from the wall. "Which doctor did you have in mind? Does Ramon do house calls, too? Have you got some secret doctor friend you've been keeping in your pocket all this time?"

Alison dropped her hem, raising her eyes to Sarah's in irritation. "Don't be ridiculous," she said shortly, "Of course I don't have some - some - _secret doctor friend_. I meant that if it's something other than the clone lung problem, a regular doctor might be able to help."

She might have a point, and yet - "How are we going to get Cosima to a doctor without the DYAD swooping in and taking her off? Don't forget she's not even a local, she's American!"

Alison sighed again, like Sarah was stubbornly refusing to accept an obvious and established point. "I thought by now that you of all people would have realised the benefits of being clones, Sarah. We all look _exactly_ alike."


	9. Chapter 9

The airport was the usual white and beige, a repeating array of slightly chipped tiles and carpet that had seen better days and too many shoes. An endless array of travellers traipsed past, pulling travel bags with squeaking, dodgy wheels and children with squeaking, squabbling voices. They glanced at the signs overhead, squinting for directions, and turned away, exhausted by the bright lights and the distance they'd come to travel; the life sucked out of them by the distance they'd travelled already.

Sound echoed from the tiles in the departure lounge, but to Delphine it seemed strangely muted. Perhaps it was simply that she no longer cared about anything so mundane as the strained tones of the mother berating a running child behind her, or the irritation of the suited man across from her, discussing his stock options on a bluetooth headpiece. They seemed very, very far away, and utterly irrelevant when confronted with her own need to get back to Canada, Toronto, and Cosima.

Cosima. God, ___Cosima_. She'd been so far away, so afraid, and yet unable to return without a way to help her. What would have been the point, after all, of rushing back - risking the wrath of the DYAD along the way - if all she could do was sit by her bedside and pray, hold her hair back when she coughed blood and her life away? So she'd stayed, a prisoner to her own need to provide some form of hope (and to the DYAD, but their close surveillance was almost irrelevant in her desperation), and learned to bite her nails, terrified at the prospect that Cosima might die without her.

One day she'd stared at her phone too long, Cosima on the screen, knowing the number she stared at was blocked anyway (she had a number the DYAD didn't, Cosima's 'clone phone', labelled as ___organosilicon lab results_ (C-Si an abbreviation she wouldn't forget) for use only in emergencies), and panicked. If Cosima had died, would anyone have even told her? She jabbed at keys in a frenzy, dialling Cosima's second number (she knew it by heart anyway) only to drop the phone when it rang.

When she retrieved it, the number on the screen was a single digit different to Cosima's. That was the only reason she took the call, knowing that the DYAD were watching and testing her at all times. She'd never been so grateful to hear an English accent swear at her down a phone line. Sarah told her that Cosima was alive and that they needed her advice in quick succession, followed moments later by a text containing a skype name.

Contact with Sarah helped some, offered an illusion of having some influence on the outcome. She'd been astounded to hear of Scott's success building a treatment from Helena's embryonic stem cells, but frightened too, knowing how much stress Cosima's body was already under. The only thing she could offer from Frankfurt was advice, recommend how to lower Cosima's body temperature and get fluids into her, uncomfortable when she asked Sarah if she knew how to find a vein. Now she knew Cosima was alive, but hearing how she was struggling when she was still so far away was its own particular form of torture. Knowing that her brilliant girl hadn't been lucid in days, had spiked a fever, had her eyes closed so long they lost her goddamn glasses… when Sarah reluctantly told her that Cosima had seized again, estimated her body weight below fifty kilos, Delphine had gotten off the phone and then cried so hard she vomited.

That was weeks ago, weeks of sneaking around her minders and the back halls of the Frankfurt DYAD, but the acrid scent hadn't left her. The nerves, the fear haven't left her. But neither had the need to see Cosima, to hold her; to tell her again that she loved her.

From everything Sarah said, Cosima had been getting better, Scott's stem cell treatment a surprising success. But Sarah's reassurance alone hadn't been enough, and there was always the chance of relapse, and Delphine had used that combination of fears to propel her forward, to suck every iota of clone information out of the DYAD possible and then make a run for it. And yet she'd known she might not make it, had made a copy of every byte of data she'd found and couriered it ahead of her before succumbing to the need, at the last, to call Cosima.

More than half of her side of that conversation had been her insistent, repeated, assurances of her love. Cosima had cried, tried to dissuade her from returning, but by then the die had been cast and she'd been mere hours away from her flight. Now, she clung to the memory of Cosima vowing her own love and concern, begging Delphine not to endanger herself. She held the words close to her heart while dissecting every aspect of Cosima's voice: the pauses for air; the thready note; the emotionality. Her Cosima had never given way to anyone or anything, and she was so afraid that this illness could have changed her into someone Delphine no longer recognised.

A hand touched her shoulder, and Delphine flinched, looked up.

"We're ready for you," said the flight attendant, and Delphine nodded, picked up her carry on bag, and walked onto the plane.


End file.
